Boutaris under fire after musing over renaming of Thessaloniki's Macedonia Airport

Thessaloniki Mayor Yiannis Boutaris has come under attack after suggesting that the city’s airport, currently named Macedonia Airport, could be renamed.

Boutaris reportedly made the comments during a meeting of the city council on Monday, when he also proposed changing the name of Thessaloniki’s bus station. He explained his views in the media on Tuesday morning.

“I didn’t say we should change them, I simply posed the question,” he told Skai TV. “We should think about why this name, Macedonia, has divided so many people.”

Boutaris suggested that the airport could be named after former Aris and Greece basketball star Nikos Gallis.

“He should leave the diplomacy and the negotiations to the diplomats and concentrate on his duties, such as sanitation and trash collection in his city,” responded New Democracy’s shadow foreign minister Giorgos Koumoutsakos.